


In which Gabriel is the king of flirting

by Whit Merule (whit_merule)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - College/University, Bad Flirting, Bad Pick-Up Lines, Baking, Cookies, Fluff, M/M, umbrella sharing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-22
Updated: 2016-11-22
Packaged: 2018-09-01 13:50:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8626960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whit_merule/pseuds/Whit%20Merule
Summary: Gabriel is the best at flirting. He's awesome. He's magical. He... can't get that cute floppy-haired art student to notice him. Not even when he draws dicks on his coffee cup every morning. What's the most adorable barista in the world to do?





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StarlightDragon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightDragon/gifts).



Gabriel was the king of flirting. Everyone knew it. He told them so all the time.

He was charming. He was witty. He was reasonably good-looking and knew how to persuade people he was more than that. He could flatter his way into anybody’s good books.

But he still couldn’t get that gorgeous, adorable, floppy-haired art student to notice that he was hitting on him.

Every weekday morning at eight he’d shuffle into the coffee shop where Gabriel worked, rubbing his eyes and mussed-up and yawning hugely behind his hands, rubbing them together in their patched brown woollen gloves to chase away the late-winter cold. Every day he’d order the same boring boring black coffee in a take-away cup just in case he had to run away early (which he never did), and he’d smile the same sleepy distracted adorable diffident smile when he thanked Gabriel for making it. Then he’d curl up at one of their corner tables with his books and pencils (or charcoal, or pastels, or whatever it was that day), and go to work.

Gabriel had considered the question at great length over the last month or so—usually out loud, to Balthazar or Charlie or Anna or Castiel, until Balthazar draped a towel over his head to shut him up—and had come to the conclusion that there was absolutely nothing in the world so attractive as the expression of concentration on the face of a gorgeous genius as he made gorgeous works of genius. Unless it was the way he sometimes nibbled on his thumb when he was thinking. Or lowered his glasses on his nose to squint over the top of them for a different view. Or the way he filled his worn old shirts. Or—

Or the way he _completely failed to notice_ every time Gabriel winked and flattered and tried to draw him into cheerfully suggestive conversation, because apparently his brain travelled straight from sleep to art without bothering to notice mundane details like the cutest of baristas in front of him.

Life wasn’t fair.

Unfair things about it included the fact that their morning rush usually started around eight, so Gabriel never had a chance to stroll casually out from behind the counter and subtly check out his art work as he subtly cleared up a nearby table and maybe subtly plonked himself down in the seat nearby and subtly informed him that he was the hottest thing ever, way hotter than coffee, and Gabriel wanted to touch his hair because it was stupid and gorgeous and soft and also maybe kiss him a bit and grab his butt.

... hotter than coffee.

Gabriel was a genius.

He picked up a sharpie.

 

***

 

“He _didn’t even notice_ ,” whined Gabriel the next day, when Hot Art Student had left. “Caaaas. I am ruined. My life is a failure. Send me away to live among eels and whelks. I have no meaning anymore. I hate everything.”

“Then make yourself useful and hate the mess on the back counter,” said Castiel, handing him a wet cloth. “What didn’t he notice?”

Gabriel wordlessly held out Tall Floppy And Handsome’s cup, with woeful eyes.

Castiel looked at it. He looked at Gabriel, with patient blankness.

Gabriel jabbed a finger at the warning down the bottom. Parts of it were blacked out with sharpie, so now it read, “Caution: ~~this beverage~~ you’re ~~currently enjoying is~~ extremely hot.”

“Perhaps,” said Castiel, “he just had the good taste not to mention it.”

“I hate you too,” Gabriel informed him grandly, and shunned him for a full two minutes as he cleaned the back counter.

 

***

 

That was Tuesday.

On Wednesday, he jotted down on the lid (the way they usually wrote orders) “Black / large / no sugar because he’s 2 sweet already”.

The lid lay discarded, upside-down, on the table until Adorable Moose left.

On Thursday, Gabriel wrote on the protective sleeve, “Roses are red, violets are blue, this coffee is hot, and so are you.”

Gabriel’s Future Husband absent-mindedly shredded the sleeve without looking at it as he frowned over the latest problem with his doubtlessly perfect art.

On Friday, Gabriel drew flowers on the cup, and also added his number and a winking smiley face. Zip. Nada. Zilch.

On Saturday, Gabriel greeted him with a loud “Hey there gorgeous,” and gave him a cup with a dick drawn on it. So maybe he was sulking a bit.

Object Of Gabriel’s Lusts And Fondness rubbed a hand through his hair, yawning, and inhaled the coffee scent with a blissful sigh as he did his zombie-shuffle to his table.

Anna told Gabriel off for drawing obscenities at work.

 

***

 

Sunday was Gabriel’s day off, so he went to the park to nurse his hurt pride. It was a grey, heavy sort of day, and not many people were there: just a few parents and kids huddled around the play equipment, bundled up and warm. Gabriel didn’t feel the grumbling and shrieks struck the proper note of wounded agony, so he strolled around the higher paths of the park, pretending they looked even slightly like brooding wind-swept moors and not a rather pretty manicured garden at the start of spring.

... but because the gods loved him, he wasn’t _quite_ the only one up here.

Hot Art Student had set up an easel and was painting one of the gardens.

Gabriel lurked suavely in the background for a while, because he was trying to work out exactly which of his magnificent collection of pick-up lines would suit the occasion and definitely not because his belly had butterflies in it.

And just then the heavens opened.

Crack of thunder, greyness suddenly turning into an oncoming torrent sweeping in over the brow of the hill, and Fire Of Gabriel’s Loins looked up and swore and was suddenly all of a bustle trying to get his things packed up.

Well, what could a gallant gentleman do but dash over to help?

Two minutes of consternation and hurried explanations later and all of Sweetness Incarnate’s things were packed up and (mostly) dry, and they were running and slipping down the hill to the shelter of a little pagoda.

“Ugh,” said Even Hotter When Wet, taking off his glasses, shaking the water out of his ridiculous perfect mane and grinning at Gabriel. “Thanks, man, you have no idea. I’m Sam. Sam Winchester.”

“That,” decided Gabriel, “is a perfect name. Gabriel Novak, but I like your surname better. Mind sharing it with me?”

But Mr Perfect Name missed the wink, because now he was peering intently at Gabriel. “Hey. Do I know you?”

“ _Sam_ ,” Gabriel complained, because now he knew his name and he could, “I’ve only been serving you coffee almost every morning for the last _month_.”

Sam Winchester’s face contorted into a (perfect, adorable) grimace of consternation. “Shit, sorry. I have the worst memory for faces. And, well, you know what it’s like before coffee.”

“I know what _you’re_ like before coffee,” Gabriel told him. “It’s adorable. Fortunately I am a very tolerant man in the mornings. I like to bring my boyfriend breakfast in bed.”

And come on, that _had_ to be a broad enough hint, now that Sam had actually _noticed_ him and was _looking_ at him. But instead of blushing, or flirting back, Sam actually moved back a bit and his face fell. And when he smiled it wasn’t with the openness and the warmth that had been there before.

“That’s really sweet, Gabriel. Uh. So. How long have you been working there?”

They were trapped in the pagoda for a full fifteen minutes before the rain started to ease, and even if Sam wasn’t _quite_ as responsive as Gabriel hoped—even if he only smiled and laughed and shook his head and rolled his eyes at all of Gabriel’s best flirtations—it was still a quarter-hour to delight and entrance. Sam was warm and witty and passionate and fun, and there was no way anybody could have resisted the power of that smile when it was turned right on them, and shit, Gabriel was so smitten. And Sam really seemed to actually _like_ him, to think he was _funny_ and _clever_ and this was definitely the best day of Gabriel’s life. At least this month of it anyway.

At last Sam stuck his head out, and pondered for a moment, then produced a big umbrella from amongst all his gear.

“I think this is the best chance we’re going to get for a while. You coming, or do you want to wait it out?”

Gabriel hesitated. He really really hated getting wet, and though the rain wasn’t as heavy as before it was still definitely more than a light drizzle. But, hang around here in the pagoda for way too long, or walk for a while with Sam? Not even a choice.

“Rain? What’s rain?” he said brightly, treating the falling droplets to a mistrustful look. “Just a little bracing dampness in the air! One of my favourite things! No problem!”

“Uh-huh,” said Sam, half-laughing, gathering up his things. “Well, if you get tired of your favourite thing, tough guy, there’s room under here with me.”

... damn.

Now Gabriel had to brave it out or Sam would laugh at him.

He tried to keep up the rapid patter of conversation as they made their way out of the park, but it was tricky when the weather insisted on feeling up his _neck_ with cold wet fingers. He huddled his hands into his pockets and his neck into his collar and tried to avoid puddles, until finally Sam said, “You look like a sulky drowned kitten, come here,” and drew a half-protesting Gabriel in against his side with one strong, warm arm.

Okay. That was better.

Gabriel stopped protesting pretty quickly.

 

***

 

Because the world was a beautiful place, things got way better after that. Sam always smiled at him _properly_ in the mornings and greeted him by name, even if he still wasn’t very chatty. And when he left, if they weren’t busy, he’d lean on the counter for a few minutes to ~~flirt~~ talk. Gabriel learned all sorts of important information, like Sam’s birthday, and his favourite kind of paint, and the fact that one of the legs of his bed was too short so it rocked a bit sometimes if he moved wrong, and the colour of Sam’s brother’s car. He stored all these facts carefully away in the SAM WINCHESTER treasure trove in his mind, and put up with all of Balthazar’s teasing, and kept on pining.

Because no matter how much he flirted, he just couldn’t seem to persuade Sam that he wasn’t being all platonic here.

And it turned out that pining for your absolutely perfect _friend_ was even worse than pining for some absolutely perfect stranger.

Then one day, Sam seemed off-colour. The next day he was coughing and flushed. The day after that he didn’t come at all.

Or the day after.

“He doesn’t have any family in the city!” moaned Gabriel to Anna. “What if he has nobody to look after him! What if he falls over in the bathroom and hits his head! What if he runs out of hot soup!”

“You said he’s living in college dorms,” said Anna, with heartless common sense. “His dorm mate will make sure he doesn’t randomly die in the bathroom. Go get that sandwich out of the panini press, it’s about to burn.”

So of course, that night, Gabriel did the only sensible thing he could do.

He broke into Sam’s college building.

 

***

 

The door to Sam’s room was unlocked, which was frankly poor security. (Gabriel wasn’t a stalker. He knew the number because it was 669 and they’d been joking about it last week, okay.)

Sam’s dorm mate was out, and Sam was asleep on his bed, face down, one socked foot dangling off the side, snoring the faint snores of a heavy head cold into the pillow.

Gabriel stood by the bed and glared crossly down at him in a completely non-stalkerish way.

“You,” he said to the unconscious figure, “are running up an _astronomical bill_ in emotional damages.”

Then he covered him with a blanket, and went to do the other only sensible thing he could do, which was bake get-well-soon cookies. In the kitchenette on Sam’s floor.

In retrospect, it was a little strange that of all the students nearby the only one to show up at any point during the noisy, delicious-smelling process was the one with a blocked nose. But show up he did, just as Gabriel was due to pull the trays out of the oven.

“Um,” he said, blinking vaguely in the light and looking even more adorable and woebegone and mussed and confused than he did in the mornings. “Gabriel? Huh?”

Gabriel jabbed him in the chest, then pushed him backwards toward a chair. “You,” he said firmly, “are going to sit down. Because this is a sensible thing for _sick sasquatches_ to do because if they fall down they tend to squash everybody else around them.”

“... are you baking cookies in my kitchen at midnight.”

“Obviously,” Gabriel grumped at him, pulling on his oven mitts and opening the oven door. “Because you’re sick. I don’t like it when you’re sick, Sam, you need to stop that.”

“I’ll... get right on it,” said Sam, beginning to smile; and he settled into the chair and leaned his head against the wall. “Should I ask how you got in here?”

“Funny story,” said Gabriel, teasing the cookies off the baking tray and onto a cooling rack. “Did you know there’s a goblin by the name of Wilberforce who lives in the cellar of this building and lets you in through the sewer entrance if you know the password? It’s not very hygienic. You should get the janitor to look into that.”

“You’re actually kinda insane, aren’t you,” said Sam in a fond wistful sleepy kind of voice.

“Do nothing by halves,” said Gabriel, put a couple of hot cookies on a plate and handed them over with a flourish. “Be magnificently mad or go home.”

Sam looked at him for a moment with something wondering and shy in his eyes. Then he dropped them, and shook his head, and took the plate. “Speaking of home. Won’t your boyfriend be worried if you’re not there to cook him breakfast?”

Gabriel blinked. “Boyfriend?”

“Yeah.” Sam picked at one of the cookies, then broke it in half to let the steam escape, not meeting Gabriel’s eyes. “How’s it going with him? I mean. You never really mention him, even though you talk about all your friends all the time. So. I guess I just... um? Sorry, I think I’m a bit out of it, I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

“... _boyfriend_?” Gabriel added, in what he felt was a perfectly reasonable request for additional information.

“Um.” Sam broke off a bit of cookie from the broken bit of cookie, then looked up at Gabriel with a faint frown. “Yes. Your... boyfriend?”

“... I don’t have a boyfriend.”

“You...” Sam went very still, though his eyes flickered all over Gabriel’s face. Cautiously, he said, “You did _say_ you did.”

“Uh?”

“You said you like to cook your boyfriend breakfast.”

Gabriel gaped at him.

“... when we first talked? In the pagoda?” added Sam weakly.

Gabriel threw his hands up into the air. “ _Hypothetical_ boyfriend, Sam! _Hypothetical_! It was a pick-up line, you feverish enormous dimwit, it was a ‘that’s a lovely dress and I bet it’d look even better on the floor of my room in the morning’ come-on, it was me saying ‘I want to cook you breakfast after we work up an appetite getting hot and sweaty and cuddly in the sheets you colossally beautiful Greek statue with a bird’s nest on top’, because I was _hitting on you_ , like I’ve been _hitting on you ever since_ —”

It is possible that he might have gone on in this vein for quite some time, if Sam hadn’t put his cookie plate on the counter and loomed suddenly to his feet and poked Gabriel in the chest.

“You hit on _everybody_ ,” he pointed out, low and intense like this was an argument only not.

“That’s because it’s _fun_ ,” cried Gabriel, furious at the colossal unfairness of all this wasted time when they could have been making out weeks ago, “because I like flirting with people and I am really really good at it not that you’d know you adorably perfect numbskull. I flirt with you because I _like_ you and I want to kiss you and spoil you and make you breakfast and cookies and replace your stupid gloves and bite your nipples and—”

Sam grabbed at his arms. “You,” he said, “have been driving me crazy. And dammit, Gabriel, I can’t _kiss_ you because I’m all sick, but—”

“I drive you crazy?” beamed Gabriel, and flung himself into Sam’s arms. “I would get sick for you!”

Sam refused to kiss him, like a spoilsport, and because he was so tall Gabriel couldn’t steal his mouth which was just unfair.

“Yes, well, I also just feel like crap,” said Sam, cuddling Gabriel up against him and nuzzling into his hair, “so how about I just eat the cookies you made me and you can do the whole nursemaid thing until I’m better and we’ll call it even.”

“Does that mean I can stay the night?” asked Gabriel hopefully.

“Well, it’s probably the only way you’re going to get any sleep before your shift tomorrow.”

“This is true.”

“You madman.”

“Guilty!”

 

***

 

Three days later, Gabriel beamed, and pushed a takeaway cup of black coffee across the counter. Then he leaned over for a kiss.

“I made it just for you!” he announced, and pointed to the cup.

This time, Sam did look at it. And he burst out laughing.

“Just so you know,” he said, and reached across the counter to muss up Gabriel’s hair, “I’m keeping you.”

 

_And in case the image above decides to break again: it's an image of a Starbucks takeaway cup with an arrow pointing to the warning down the bottom of the cup, which has a few strategic words blacked out, so that it reads "Caution: ~~the beverage~~ you're ~~currently holding is~~ extremely hot."_

__

__

 

 


End file.
